Vice President Mike Pence said Tuesday the White House continues to give "serious consideration" to moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

And President Donald Trump is "personally committed to resolving the Israeli and Palestinian conflict" and is "making valuable progress" toward that goal, Pence said at an Israeli Independence Day commemoration.

The remarks came a day day before Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas visits the White House.

Like most countries, the United States maintains its embassy in Tel Aviv because Israelis and Palestinians have competing claims to Jerusalem. Israel considers Jerusalem its undivided capital but Palestinians seek east Jerusalem for the capital of a future state.

Previous presidents like Bill Clinton and George W. Bush had said they would move the embassy to Jerusalem while campaigning but didn't follow through on the pledge, Politico noted.

"It would essentially validate the view that all of Jerusalem now belongs to Israel," Aaron David Miller, a former Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiator, told the news outlet last year. "It's hard to come up with a single act that would make the Middle East burn more than it is burning right now."